7 - Biocompatibility of nanomaterials for tissue engineering

Abstract

Tissue engineering (TE) is a new area of research that aims to develop, repair, or replace various tissues or cells with bioactive materials. It improves organ deficiency as well as the functionality of different organs and helps to formulate different biologically similar and safe tissues or organs. For the last several decades TE is the most promising tool to solve the complication related to traditional implants. Nanomaterials are tiny particles has a huge influence on TE and biomedicals. Huge numbers of nanomaterials are already in the preclinical and clinical trial processes, especially for TE. But still, there is a concern about the biocompatibility and cytotoxicity of nanomaterials for different purposes. Lacking standard procedure and assessment the toxicity study of nanomaterials is in a mist. So, the biocompatibility of nanomaterials in TE is a very important step for TE. It is already established that nanotechnology has more stability, and unique characteristics related to surface morphology, small size, and excellent binding property have potentiated nanotechnology for application in TE, such as implanting, scaffolding, and tissue repair. Nanomaterials showed remarkable improvement, especially in different TE, such as bone TE, vascular grafting, and nerve regeneration. But still, biocompatibility is an issue so different polymeric and metallic nanoparticles with different conjugated bioactive materials are prepared and it was applied in different TE applications, such as implantation. This chapter further discusses in detail the biocompatibility of nanomaterials and their appropriate applications in the field of TE.